Chanel Collection Côte D’Azur: Rouge Coco Baroque

December 5, 2010

Chanel recently had a mini-release called Collection Côte D’Azur that includes the nail polish Riva, and several Rouge Coco lipsticks that were re-promotes from the permanent line.

Recently, Chanel added a new shade, Baroque ($30 /#30), to the collection in the same moisturizing Rouge Coco formula. This shade is available only online at Chanel.com (according to the Chanel boutique in San Francisco, neither the Chanel boutiques or department store counters will get this shade).

Baroque is not a shade that I would have expected to work on my very pale, warm skin tone. Once again, Chanel defies expectations. The Rouge Coco formula is lightweight and glowy enough that my lips look alive and beautiful, which is not an effect that I would have expected from a darker bronze-brown. The formula is not sheer, but rather goes on with a nice opacity to completely blot out the natural pink-mauve color of my lips.

I was also surprised to find how beautifully Baroque worked with the other items in the Collection Côte D’Azur. Although not a traditional cruise/spring color, Baroque worked as a nice shade to “anchor” the lighter tones of the Promesse eyeshadow quad, as well as the blue-toned Le Vernis Riva nail polish. The colors in the rest of Collection Côte D’Azur are so light and ephemeral, they almost need a deeper shade on the lips that emphasize and add depth to the face. Brilliantly, Chanel’s Baroque stops just precisely short enough of dark and vampy. It’s a highly wearable shade–office, party, and (why not?) the Côte D’Azur.

Here is a comparison of Baroque with the brick-red Rouge Coco Vendome and the Holiday 2010 Rouge Coco Patchouli: